The present invention refers to an axial bearing device for the cylinder barrel in an axial piston machine, particularly of so-called bent-axis-type, i.e. with the axis of the barrel inclined to the axis of the drive disk, said barrel being rotatably journalled in a housing, which is open at one end, and adapted to be resiliently urged by means of a spring member against a valve disk at the other end of said housing, which is closed.
In prior axial piston machines, the cylinder barrel mostly is journalled either by means of a central bearing unit and biasing springs or some kind of annular locking washer around the external surface of the cylinder barrel at its end adjacent the valve disc.
The first-mentioned kind of bearing known, e.g. from the U.S. Pat. No. 2,858,771 has the disadvantage that the central bearing unit requires great space, particularly in the radial direction and therefore the cylinder barrel is required to have an excessive diameter or a relatively greater number of axial pistons is required for the same displacement.
The expedient of providing the bearing by means of an annular locking washer around the outer periphery of the cylinder barrel is disclosed in the Swedish Lay-Open Print 302,889. This kind of bearing is relatively simple to manufacture but elongates the barrel and thus the machine to some extent and thus causes longer inlet paths to the cylinder bores for the axial pistons in the cylinder barrel. A bearing device of similar kind in principle is also known from the French patent specification 1,235,100. From the French patent specification 714,963 it is also known to provide a similar biasing action by a cup or "Belleville" spring in a machine which is of radial piston type, in which however, the same difficulties are not met in this respect as in machines of the axial piston type.